Apple cuts processor speed in half, drops two cores, and cuts the price by $200

It has been rumored for the past few weeks that Apple would launch lower cost iMacs to make its desktop range more appealing to customers. Early reports pegged the launch for WWDC, but that obviously didn’t happen. However, Apple today made its move, announcing a new budget-minded 21.5” iMac with a 1080p display.

Given its bottom-rung placement in the iMac family, this machine is in no way a speed demon. In fact, it comes with a lowly dual-core Intel Core i5 processor running at a mere 1.4GHz (Turbo Boost up to 2.7GHz) and an Intel HD Graphics 5000 integrated GPU. For comparison, the previous entry-level iMac comes with a 2.7GHz Intel Core i5 processor (Turbo Boost up to 3.2GHz) and Intel Iris Pro Graphics.

Other features include 8GB of RAM, a 500GB HDD (5400 RPM), 802.11ac Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0.

The new entry-level iMac starts at $1,099, which represents a $200 reduction compared to the previous entry-level model.

"Intel is investing heavily (think gazillions of dollars and bazillions of engineering man hours) in resources to create an Intel host controllers spec in order to speed time to market of the USB 3.0 technology." -- Intel blogger Nick Knupffer